


A Hundred Indecisions

by waveleafcloud



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: But Not Exactly Time Travel Fix-It, Fix-It, Grief/Mourning, Happy Ending, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative, Post-Episode: s04e13 No Better To Be Safe Than Sorry, The Magic of Love or Quantum Physics, Timey-Wimey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-11
Updated: 2019-06-11
Packaged: 2020-04-24 02:33:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 17,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19164031
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/waveleafcloud/pseuds/waveleafcloud
Summary: Quentin and Eliot were robbed of the time they deserve together.Fortunately, when you’ve devoted a lifetime to solving a mosaic in pursuit of the Time Key, it turns out that Time, itself, is on your side.





	1. Visions

**Author's Note:**

> I didn’t think I was capable of writing fix-it, but here goes.  
> \- This contains the big spoiler for 4x13, but changes the outcome, because I reject show reality and substitute my own.  
> \- That said, for much of the story, characters think that major character death has occurred. So it is, in a lot of ways, about grief, just in case you don’t want to read that. I promise a happy ending.  
> \- Some liberties are taken with the timeline, and the show’s treatment of time magic. I think this fits in with what we know about the time loops from seasons 1 through 3 without too much trouble, but it may not adhere perfectly to the episodes in season 4 dealing with timeline 23 or the time switching spell. The jump into Fillory future at the end doesn't happen either.  
> \- The title is of course from “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” by T.S. Eliot, because it may be a cliché, but it’s such a good one. Relevant passage at the end.

Quentin walks through a door, Metrocard in hand.

Or he tries to, at least. The instant he steps under the doorframe, he is immobilized by an invisible force. There are flashing lights, the wail of a shrill alarm, and the arm of a person pushing him back the way he came. The noise quiets, and the lights stop.

“Unauthorized entry,” she says. “Please wait while I assess.”

It’s a bureaucratic woman in a dark, somber suit. Quentin stands still while she waves something at him. It looks a bit like one of the metal detector wands that airport security personnel use, except it lights up as well as chirps when she squiggles it in front of his chest.

She studies the pattern of lights and colors along the side of the device carefully, before switching it off and appearing to tuck it into thin air. “Some routine questions in this circumstance,” she begins.

“Is this common?” Quentin asks, because he thought that he was moving on, at least to the way station part of the Underworld, before he moves on for real. It’s jarring to be held back at the last minute, just when he thought he might finally be at peace.

“It’s not common, but it’s not unheard of. Generally it represents an omission in the secrets interview; for example, a repressed experience that an individual has trouble accessing, even at the end of their life. The interviewers are quite competent, of course, but a few particularly troubled souls slip through and have to be sent back for more… extensive therapy. But it seems that isn’t the problem with you.”

“Oh. What is the problem, then?”

“Magic,” she says. “Specifically, magic that binds you to life. Have you, perhaps, cast an immortality tether? Attempted to split your soul and invest it into objects? Made a bargain for extended life with a deity of old?”

“Uh, no. No to all of those.”

“Hm. Then, have you been the caster, or the object, of a spell that involves the fabric of the universe, and which has not yet run its course? For instance, linking your life force to the persistence of a physical space, a particular event that has yet to happen, or the passage of time itself?”

Quentin is about to answer in the negative again, but he feels a sudden weight in his sweatshirt pocket, and reaches inside to find a small book, which he extracts. He doesn’t recall putting the book there, but… “Oh,” he says vaguely, remembering. “I cast a spell. Months ago. But it didn’t… I didn’t even remember, until now. It didn’t work. It’s, uh—” The cover is blank, but he opens the book to the title page. “It’s from _A Revised History of Time_.”

“ _A Revised History of Time_?” she repeats. Her voice remains neutral, but her eyebrows have risen at the sight of the book in his hands. “If that is, indeed, the original volume in your possession, then we’ve diagnosed the issue.”

“It is,” Quentin says, holding the book out for her to inspect, but she doesn’t take it.

“This is certainly uncommon,” she says. “In fact, in my tenure here, I’ve only met two people who cast the spell you’re speaking of. And no one who hasn’t cast it has ever been able to see the text of it. There are Librarians in every branch who would kill to have the book you’re holding, if only they could read it.”

“They’d kill for less,” Quentin mutters. He’s never going to think of libraries the same way he did growing up, as quiet havens housing the entryways into fictional worlds.

“Well, that’s settled. We’ll mark you down as ‘time magic, unreconciled, potential for universal paradox.’ Now, if you’ll surrender your Metrocard, I’ll give you a return pass, which should allow the spell to run its course, averting any time-reality bending scenarios.”

“Wait,” Quentin says. “You’re resurrecting me? Because of a spell I tried and failed to do? I told you, I can’t even remember what it was. I just know it didn’t work.” The memory is hovering just out of reach, like a word on the tip of his tongue.

“It wasn’t complete,” she corrects. “It still isn’t, but it’s having a good try, out there in the living world, it seems. This magic you’ve accessed… all magic that deals with the fabric of reality and time is complex, but things like time loops and Tesla flexions can be created by skilled Magicians, using their normal reserves and knowledge of magic. On the other hand, your _life force_ is quite literally entangled in the stream of time itself, which is a fundamental component of the universe. This isn’t a resurrection, per se, but it’s a temporary reprieve. Until you relinquish the spell, or the spell relinquishes you, you can’t move on. Time is the domain of the living; it has no meaning in death, except for the people left behind.”

Something is stirring in Quentin’s consciousness. “Complete… oh. I have to pass the spell on to someone else. That’s the last step. But, I mean, I’m dead now, right? I can’t do magic.”

“It’s a time spell,” she says. “You’ve already _done_ the magic, I would assume, given the situation you find yourself in now. At some point, you cast a net ahead of yourself, into the future, and it’s been waiting for you. Now, it seems, you’ve caught up to it. And it’s ensnared you.”

“Oh,” Quentin says, not really understanding. “Can you… you seem to know a bit about it. Can you tell me what the others did, the others who performed this spell? So I know where I have to go, or what I have to do, to pass it on?”

She considers. “You’re the one who has the book. There must be something special about you, when it comes to Time with a capital T. But I can tell you that one of the individuals who spoke of casting this spell arrived here twice, and only passed through the doorway once. When he got here, the second time, I asked him where the unfinished spell had taken him. And he said: it takes you where you need to go, and when. It’s guided by the outcome woven throughout the casting, which acts as a compass, to work your will through the fabric of time.” Her voice has turned strange, like she’s repeating something she learned by rote long ago.

“Intent. It’s about intent,” Quentin recalls from somewhere, like a forgotten dream. He’s clutching the book to his chest, as if her mild interest might motivate her to take it from him, even though he was offering it to her willingly just a second ago.

“And yes, normally, death would prevent you from performing magic in the living world. But since you started the spell before death, it calls for closure, with a power that transcends even what we do here.” She takes his Metrocard and hands him a Get Out of Jail Free Card, straight from his childhood memories of Monopoly, instead. He tucks it into the book without thinking. “Go where the spell takes you, Quentin Coldwater. I’ll hold your Metrocard at the door and see you on your return, one way or another, I’m sure.”

Quentin blinks. “Well, it’s a time spell, right? If this isn’t a resurrection, and I complete the spell, shouldn’t I come back to the same moment we’re in, so it’ll be like I never left? If that still makes sense, where we are now.” Or if it ever did. Time magic is complicated.

She smiles enigmatically. “Oh, it does and it doesn’t. This place is outside of time, but you’re still _connected_ to time, as it exists in the world you’re leaving. Or not leaving, just yet, as the case may be. It depends on what the outcome of the spell is, after all. The intent.”

“I wanted Eliot alive,” Quentin says, flipping to the last page of the book, where he’s tucked the Monopoly card. It’s coming back to him, slowly: the circumstances under which he cast the spell.

Eliot was dead, or so he had thought. The Monster had said he felt his soul leave his body, and Quentin had lay in bed at night, staring into the empty darkness that stretched ahead of him, contemplating the bleakness of reality. When he woke up and found the book, or the book found him, and the spell called for _intent_ , all he had been able to muster was “Eliot.” All he had wanted was to save Eliot’s life, no matter the cost.

“Is _that_ what you wanted, Quentin? Truly? Is that _all_?”

It’s funny. If someone had asked Quentin at any earlier point in this conversation to describe the person he was talking to, all he could have said was that it was a woman in a dark suit, otherwise utterly nondescript. But as she says the last words, he sees, or gets the impression of, reddish-brown hair. Her accent, as she speaks, sounds British. She looks just like…

Recognition skims off the surface of his mind, escaping him. But anyway, Quentin thinks, Eliot _has_ been saved, right? In some sense, maybe the spell he cast _has_ done what he intended, even if he can’t understand the path it took, or the strings it pulled. And if it’s cost him his life, well, that is a price Quentin was and is willing to pay.

So it’s time to pass the spell on to the next caster, whoever that may be. And then, Quentin can move on. He’s at peace with that. The question is how to do it.

He looks at the page in front of him. The entire spell is powered by intent and outcome, blathers the text. So far, so good: Eliot alive, purpose achieved. But the very last line, detailing how the spell is passed on and therefore concluded, makes no sense.

“The spell culminates in communication of the caster’s intent, along with passage of the book, to the next caster. In this way, the completion of the journey ensures the driving force of the journey, the intent, without which the spell could not have been cast.”

That is some “Bad Wolf, I create myself” circular bullshit, he thinks. Had he been so desperate that he hadn’t bothered to read to the end of the book when he cast this thing? Or had the last page not existed until now? Quentin can’t actually remember.

But wait. “’You can’t use the spell to teach yourself the spell,’” he recalls being told. It’s cooperative magic. Someone else has to give you the book, and you… you have to give it back to them. And there is something special about him, when it comes to Time with a capital T, but it’s not just him.

“The Time Key,” he whispers, and then, “ _Eliot_.”

Eliot, Eliot, Eliot, he thinks, holding the book to his non-beating heart and repeating the words like they could be its new rhythm. He doesn’t even have to cast, which is good, because he’s not sure what magic his dead, disembodied self can perform. He can feel the spell calling to him anyway, hear the ticking of a clock, suddenly.

The last thing he hears as he closes his eyes is the woman who can’t possibly be Jane Chatwin saying, “Quentin, you still have time."

 

* * *

 

Eliot opens his eyes. The first thing that registers is the pain.

Physical pain: he apparently fell asleep slumped over on the ground, back against the side of the bed. Not terribly ergonomic. There’s a crick in his neck, and his abdomen throbs like he was gutted with an axe and went through major surgery without the benefit of magic not so long ago. Oh, wait.

Then the real pain. Fuck. Quentin is dead.

Someone is calling his name from outside the bedroom. “Eliot? Are you awake?” It’s Alice, here to check on him, as Margo threatened.

“I’m here,” he manages. “Give me a minute. Or like an hour. I move slowly nowadays, and I just got up.”

There’s a pause. When she speaks next, her voice is closer, like she’s just outside his door. “Okay. I’m going to get some reading done out here. I’ll be here, if you need help, or something, all right?” Tentative, but steady, and carefully matter-of-fact.

He feels a rush of affection he never thought he would be capable of feeling for Alice Quinn, but it’s all knitted up with pain. Feeling anything hurts. He can’t. “Okay,” he says, and pushes himself up, painfully.

Something tumbles to the ground, like it was resting in his lap. It’s a small book, bound in worn leather, with nothing written on the cover.

Eliot has fallen asleep trying to read things for school before, but he definitely wasn’t reading anything last night. Maybe Margo had left it for him? What, a journal to document his emotions? It almost makes him smile (he can’t). That’s not the way Margo approaches therapy. Anyway, he remembers her leaving. This isn’t from her.

Carefully, he stoops to pick it up and sits on the edge of the bed. He opens the book. _A Revised History of Time_ , reads the title page.

He flips through it. It seems like an extremely advanced textbook, dry and theoretical. There’s a chapter entitled “A Brief Review of Classical Mechanics of Time Magic,” which is not that brief, followed by a much longer one called “Time Magic: a Quantum Perspective,” which is full of incomprehensible mathematical symbols and equations. He’s about to shut the book, honestly too tired to care about its mysterious appearance, when he lands on a page toward the end of the second chapter with the heading, “The Spell You Seek.”

Something stirs in Eliot’s memory. He reads: “For dreamers, who have devoted lifetimes to the service of Time. In your time of need, Time offers you this service in turn: a chance to unlose what was lost.”

Dreamers. Eliot was dreaming about this, he realizes, last night: the ticking of a clock, a woman with a key and a pocketwatch, and how the quest for the Time Key had claimed a lifetime. His, and Quentin’s. _A chance to unlose what was lost_. Time magic.

Oh, shit. Eliot reads through the spell as quickly as he can, but while the motions are relatively simple, the theory behind it makes no sense without reading the preceding text. Even if he read the text, he thinks, he probably wouldn’t understand it. How does he even know it’s a real spell? Or that it wouldn’t do more harm than good?

Part of him wants to say fuck it, and try anyway, but he did promise Margo he wouldn’t self-destruct. He owes it to her, at least, to make a good faith effort to understand what he’s getting into. Then, he can decide if he wants to do it anyway.

So Eliot needs someone who gets this stuff, and can explain it to him. Someone who wouldn’t stop him from pursuing dangerous, untested magic if it saves Quentin’s life. Someone like…

Well, well, well. Maybe it is a real spell. Maybe this is a sign. After all, the same morning it sent him this book, the universe has sent him Alice Quinn.

 

* * *

 

“Time magic is dangerous,” Jane Chatwin says.

Quentin is dreaming. Jane Chatwin, or Eliza, as he first knew her, is dead.

“Yes, in the fortieth timeline,” she says, like she can hear what he’s thinking. Which she probably can, since she’s in his dream.

“I’m in that timeline,” he points out.

“We’re not in any of the timelines, right now. Or we’re in all of them, at once. We’re outside of Time.”

“The clock barrens,” he realizes, as the scene forms around him, or he sees it for the first time.

“I created them.”

“Along with the time loops.”

“With a pocketwatch, powered by the key _you_ gave me.” She holds it up.

“I never knew if you knew it was me,” he says.

She smiles. “I didn’t, then. Not for a long time, not until I learned how to use it. And what I’ve done: Quentin, it’s not even a fraction of what the key is capable of.”

“Well, it was made to open the back door to magic, right?” he asks.

“Hm. That is its final purpose — its destination, let’s say. But more than any of the other components of magic and the universe, Time is about the journey. By definition.”

“That makes sense, I guess. If I don’t think about it too hard.”

“Anyway, I wasn’t concerned with subtlety. I just wanted to save the world from my brother. I waited as long as I could to use the watch, but when I saw how the Wellspring was being drained, and how powerful and monstrous he had grown, I created the time loops, and tried to fix things.” She gives a little laugh. “I wasn’t a child anymore, but they were a child’s game.”

“They’re some pretty complicated magic that no one else has ever managed to do, actually,” Quentin says.

She waves it off, like he’s complimented her cloak or boots. “Oh, I suppose. But think of the time loops like one of your video games. Your avatars die, but you’re on the outside, and you just restart the game. I click the watch, and everyone goes back to a chosen starting point. Simple enough, as far as these things go.”

“Except you weren’t on the outside of the game. The Beast killed you.”

She shrugs. “True enough. The metaphor breaks down. Even the simplest time magic is difficult to explain, or understand. That’s what makes it dangerous to do. But you might be better equipped than most. Than anyone else living, actually, except for one.” Her smile is like a hint, but he doesn’t get it.

“What?”

“Quentin. You found the Time Key. And promptly relinquished it, when you realized what you had to do. After you sacrificed what you thought was your entire life to earn it.”

“With Eliot.”

“With Eliot.” She seems to be waiting for him to realize something, but again, he doesn’t get it.

“Why don’t you just tell me what you want me to do, and save us all a lot of trouble?”

“The time loops worked, in a way. I ended the danger my brother posed to Fillory, and our world. But me, trying to manipulate time… I was a blunt instrument. Time is complex.”

“Every time, you changed one thing,” Quentin remembers.

“Trying to predict if that would create the right constellation of events for the Beast to be defeated. Small changes, large changes, random ones, specific ones based on what had happened in previous loops. But too many other things change with every string you pull.”

“The butterfly effect.”

“Exactly. The trouble is, the possibilities are infinite, and the changes that matter are minuscule. It’s not something any human mind can comprehend well enough to manipulate effectively.”

“I guess you learned your lesson,” Quentin says.

She smiles ruefully. “Yes. I died, in the timeline where my brother was defeated. But: did I _have_ to die, for him to be defeated? Or could I have lived, and everything else would have happened the same?”

“Who knows?” It’s unlikely that _everything_ would have remained the same, because who knows what other strings her life would have affected, but it’s not _impossible_ , he supposes.

She voices his thought. “If the possibilities are infinite, there had to be at least _one_ scenario in which I lived, and he died, and everyone else involved didn’t know the difference, however improbable. I just didn’t find it with the changes I made.”

“If the possibilities are infinite, you might as well wonder what would have happened if you had died, and we _hadn’t_ defeated him. No more loops, and he would have won. It doesn’t matter; it’s already done.”

“You’re missing the point, Quentin.”

“Why don’t you make it, then, Jane?”

“I’m saying, I approached time magic like all Master Magicians do: linearly.” She waves off his protest before he can make it. “Yes, yes, they were loops, which are circular. But you don’t feel the curvature of the earth when you walk on it, do you? It’s just one step straight after another. Perhaps I should say I approached time continuously, or causally. One thing happens, therefore another, and another. Cause and effect.”

“Right,” Quentin says.

“But what if I could have done it like the old gods, who created and destroyed worlds, brought people back to life or snuffed them out of existence, on a whim, as an act of _will_? They didn’t stop to think, if I go back and do this, then this other thing will happen. In any given moment, they could shape reality to their will, create the outcome of their choosing. What if we could alter a moment in time, just like that?”

“But we can’t,” he says. “We don’t have power like that. No one does.”

“I didn’t,” Jane says. “Even with the Time Key in my possession. But Quentin, even without it, you _do_.”

“That’s impossible. What, I have the power to wave my hands and change time itself? Change any given outcome?”

“Not _any_ outcome. The scope of your power is not unlimited like a god’s. But Time owes you a very specific debt, and that debt can be repaid, _if you call it in_. That’s where the spell comes in.”

“What? Can we stop with the riddles? Why can’t you just say—”

“Quentin, you _gave_ me the Time Key. All I did was use it, but your lifeblood, your experiences, they brought it into the world. You can do magic that I couldn’t, because you’re part of the key. Your life is, _and Eliot’s_. You died for it, both of you, and lived for it, and that’s woven into the very fabric of Time. That gives you power over it, don’t you see? The power to alter Time, and change the outcome. At least as it pertains to the two of you.”

Quentin knows he’s dreaming, but there’s something in the other world, the awake world, that he’s forgotten. It’s important, but it’s been so peaceful not to think about it that he’s not sure he wants to remember. But what Jane is saying, or not saying, relates to that thing.

“What spell?” he asks.

“It’s all about intent. You have to confront what you’ve _truly_ lost, and what you truly want, for it to work. The spell will help you; it’ll throw you into the stream of Time, into the moments that bring you face-to-face with that loss, and that desire. But you must _awaken_ the moments, make them sing out your intent. You have to remind Time what it owes you.”

Jane is talking faster now, and Quentin is struggling to keep up. “Wait. You’re saying there’s a spell that will throw me back in time, and I’ll relive moments and have a chance to change things? So that I can—” The thing he’s forgotten, the thing he wants to change is…

She shakes her head. “No. No, you’re thinking about what I did, changing one thing so that another thing will change down the line. But you have to think bigger than that. You have the chance to change an _outcome_. Every moment you relive with this spell is simply a chance for you to _reaffirm your intent_ , and make Time, itself, heed your call. None of the moments, individually, lead to the outcome you desire; the changes you make may not even be compatible with each other, in reality outside the spell. But taken together, they’ll imbue the fabric of Time with your will, your intent, your devotion. That’s how Time knows to repay the debt.”

“Jane. I don’t understand what the fuck you’re talking about.”

She ignores him. “The only limit you need to know is that you can’t use the spell to teach yourself the spell. Someone else has to give it to you, and you’ll give it back. That’s how the journey ends. Remember, Quentin. They’re giving it to you right now.”

“Who? What spell?” he repeats.

“It’s not too late for you,” she says, more urgently. “Quentin, you have _time_.”

That’s when he wakes up.

“Quentin,” says a voice, and it’s Eliot’s voice, but it’s not Eliot. It’s the Monster, standing at his bedside and watching him sleep. Oh. Eliot is dead. That’s what he had forgotten. “Be awake, please. You’re boring when you’re asleep.”

“I — I’m sorry. I don’t want to bore you. I’m awake now.” Quentin’s hands are trembling. He clutches the sheet, trying to still them.

“What’s that?”

Quentin looks down, where the Monster is pointing. A book is lying on his chest, leather-bound and faded. It had not been there, last night.

 _They’re giving it to you right now_ , Jane had said in the dream. The power to alter time, and change the outcome, as it pertains to him, and _Eliot_.

“Oh. Oh, it’s nothing.” If this is real, and he could cast a spell, if he could flip a switch like a god and make it so that Eliot is alive…

“Is it interesting?”

Quentin would do _anything_. “No. No, it’s very boring. That’s why I fell asleep.” Carefully not looking at it, not drawing attention, holding his breath, Quentin picks the book up and puts it on the nightstand, on the other side of the bed from the Monster. He sits up. “What do you want to do?”

 

* * *

 

“So. How are you?” Alice asks. She’s endearingly bad at small talk, but she’s trying anyway. Eliot feels that painful affection again, but breathes through it. Feelings, away. He’s on a mission, now. There might be a way to fix this, after all.

They’re at a coffee shop not far from the apartment. Alice had asked, hesitantly, if he wanted to go out for breakfast, and he had acquiesced, provided she didn’t mind walking slowly. If she reports back to Margo that he’s getting out and about, so much the better.

“I’m… I wanted to talk to you, actually.”

“Right,” she says. She takes a deep breath. “You’re right. I think we need to talk. After all, you and I… I know we’ve never been close, but I think we could really help each other, right now. I mean, more than anyone else, we lost—”

“I have a question about a book,” Eliot interrupts.

“Oh. Okay. Um, what book?”

“It’s called _A Revised History of Time_.” Alice blinks and puts her coffee cup down, without taking a sip. “Do you know it?”

“I — of course I know it. But how do _you_?”

“So, it’s a real book. You’ve read it.”

“Well, sort of. The part of it that’s still extant, anyway. I mean, it’s famous, in certain circles, as one of the great losses of magic. Eliot, why are you asking?”

“I had a dream,” Eliot says casually. “The title came up. I assume I heard it at some point, but couldn’t figure out where. And I thought, who better to ask than my friend Alice, brilliant Magician and employee of the Library to boot?”

“What was the dream?”

“What do you mean, one of the great losses of magic?”

He stares her down. She hesitates, but folds. “Well, it’s one of the most important texts on time magic. Everything before it focuses on classical theories of time travel. _A Revised History of Time_ proposes a different framework, based on quantum mechanics. If a time altering spell could be devised that worked in that way, it would be revolutionary, but none of the surviving copies of the book are complete. And no one has ever been able to prove that such a spell exists.”

“Okay. Let’s talk about this. Can you explain the quantum… framework thing?”

Alice looks puzzled by his interest, but is always game for discussions of obscure, theoretical knowledge. “Well, it’s based on the idea of quantum states. Like Schrödinger’s cat.” She then seems to realize he might be exponentially dumber than she thought, and asks, “Do you know what that is?”

“Cat in a box,” Eliot tries, because he thinks he remembers a meme to that effect.

“It’s a thought experiment. Say you put a cat in a box, and you can’t see what’s happening inside the box. And there’s also a radioactive particle in there, one that has a fifty-fifty chance of decaying.”

“Decaying?”

“Like, going boom, but not in any way you can detect from the outside of the box. If it does go boom, the cat dies, instantly and silently.”

“Poor kitty.”

“It’s random,” she continues. “It could happen, or not happen. Equal probability. So, at a given moment in time, how do you know if the cat is alive or dead?”

Eliot feels really stupid. “Um. You open the box?”

“Exactly. You have to open the box to know. So cat alive, or cat dead: those are the two quantum states.”

“I don’t get what this has to do with anything, Alice.”

“Once you open the box and _observe_ , the cat can _only_ be one of the two: alive or dead. The two possibilities can’t coexist, because they literally contradict each other, right?”

“Right,” he says, because that seems obvious.

“But _until_ you open the box, the cat could be _either_ alive or dead. With equal chance.”

“Right,” he repeats.

“That’s all it is. Quantum ‘superposition.’ Because you can’t know for sure if the cat is alive or dead, when the box is closed, the two states _do_ coexist, and the cat is, in some way, alive _and_ dead. Until you open the box.”

“Oh…kay,” Eliot says, dragging it out.

“So quantum time magic is like the Holy Grail of time magic. If you could manipulate quantum states, you could change an outcome without having to think about all the events that led up to it. Switch from cat dead to cat alive. Get it right in one try, not to mention minimize the side effects.”

“You lost me again.”

Alice must be frustrated by his inability to understand, but she’s excited enough about this topic, apparently, to keep trying. “Okay. So Schrödinger’s cat is a simple experiment, in a controlled and ideal environment.”

Nothing about that monstrosity strikes Eliot as either simple or ideal, but he stays quiet. She goes on, “But in real life, conditions are never so perfect. Like, say you get hit by a car crossing the street and die.”

“Poor me,” Eliot says.

“So if I wanted to save your life, classical time magic would involve some variation on ‘going back in time,’ or creating a loop. Trying to find something I could change in the past, that would make it so that you never got hit by the car.”

“Like Jane Chatwin did, to defeat the Beast.”

Eliot sounds a little suspicious to his own ears, but fortunately, Alice doesn’t notice, caught up in the science of it all. “Exactly. But whatever you change, it’s just a guess. It doesn’t guarantee the outcome you want, and it could cause more problems that you didn’t foresee. And where to begin? Like, I could pull you back from the crosswalk, or I could stop you from leaving the apartment today, or—”

“Or stop me from being possessed by the Monster, so I wouldn’t be walking with a cane.”

“Yeah,” she says, and loses some of the zeal at that thought. She rallies, however, and continues, “But who knows whether that, or any of those, would work, or where the changes would take us?”

Privately, Eliot thinks that last one would take them to a better world, because it might be one with Quentin in it, but he stays silent. It’s not like she isn’t thinking it too. Anyway, between Alice’s incomprehensible science and Jane Chatwin’s mystical yammering, he thinks he sort of gets this part, at least.

“So you’re saying that _normal_ time magic, if there is such a thing, works in this cause-and-effect way. Like I want to get to outcome A, so I try changing event B, and see if it takes me there, and hope it doesn’t cause bad thing C to happen along the way.”

“Exactly. Time loops happen on a macroscopic scale. Manipulation of actions or decisions or circumstances that we can see and understand. But if we try to use the Schrödinger’s cat model here, the quantum states would be—”

“Eliot alive, and Eliot dead.”

“Yeah, but that’s an oversimplification. Because what killed you wasn’t the random decay of a radioactive particle. It’s not a fifty-fifty chance. In fact, there aren’t only two states, or outcomes. There are too many other variables in play: the person driving the car, the other people on the street, whether you end up maimed, or in a coma…”

“Alice. Let’s do this in the style of _What Your Sixth Grader Needs to Know_. Go.”

“Look, every second, every _fraction_ of a second, down to the smallest element of time, something could change. There are billions of people on the planet, not to mention animals, and automated machinery, and weather conditions, and… anything could change, at any time. More than one thing can change at once. So the number of quantum states, or possibilities, for any situation, is—”

“Infinite,” he finishes her thought. “But they’re just possibilities. Only one reality exists, right now, and in every moment. It doesn’t matter what _could_ happen; it only matters what _does_ happen.”

“To us, because we’re looking at it macroscopically. We’re _observing_ the experiment, even though we’re part of it. Every moment we live, we’re ‘opening the box,’ so we know what reality we’re in. We can’t perceive all the superimposed possibilities at the same time. But if you could, it would be like… the most powerful probability spell you could imagine. Looking at what could happen in every scenario in the universe, at every moment.”

“Okay.” Eliot isn’t sure he gets it, but they need to get to the point. “But what does this have to do with time magic? The uh, Holy Grail spell thing you said.”

“Well, it’s all just theory, because no one has seen the spell. But it’s rumored that the original edition of _A Revised History of Time_ contains a spell that allows you to do outcome-based time magic. Like, say I live in a world where outcome 1 happened.”

“Eliot died, crossing the street."

“But I want outcome 2 to have happened.”

“Eliot didn’t die, crossing the street.”

“So I don’t play the cause-and-effect game. We don’t think about time as this continuous series of events that are all interrelated, like dominoes. I just cast a spell that exchanges one discrete outcome for another, at one specific moment in time, affecting nothing else. It takes advantage of the idea that all the superimposed quantum states coexist, in every moment, as long as the box is closed. You pick which outcome you want, and then open the box. Reality shifts, and no one notices.”

“How is it possible that nothing else would change, though?”

“That’s what I’m saying. Up until the moment of truth, the moment we open the box, the moment you died, or didn’t, everything else has gone on the exact same way. In that moment, the spell sifts through all the infinite possibilities of things that could happen simultaneously. It finds the one state in which the outcome I want occurs, and nothing else changes, at least, not big picture, not in any way that we can observe. The outcome I want doesn’t have to be likely. It just has to be _possible_. After you live instead of die, of course, whatever you do obviously changes the world from what it would have been if you were dead. But no one realizes that, because they can only perceive the reality they’re in now.”

It’s confusing. It makes his head hurt. “You pick the outcome you want, for a specific moment in time,” Eliot summarizes slowly. “You cast the spell with that intent in mind, and it works out all the tiny invisible things that have to change for that to occur. So you don’t have to play the time loop guessing game.”

“Again, this is all theoretical,” Alice repeats. “Only two copies of the book are in existence, in different languages, and neither of them contains a spell. There’s just a note that the second chapter of the book is incomplete, unless the reader ‘needs it,’ to fulfill a _timeless devotion_. Or a devotion outside of time, or across time, or beyond time; the translations aren’t consistent. That’s why some scholars brush it off, as a fairytale about true love. But the book just says, if you need it, the original volume should find you.”

“Ah. I see.” Timeless devotion, he thinks. Or, the devotion that allowed for the discovery of the Time Key itself?

Alice straightens her glasses and regards him seriously. She’s gotten absorbed in the theory, as expected, which has distracted her from probing his reasons for asking. But she’s still the cleverest person he knows, more than clever enough to put it together. “Eliot,” she says, carefully. “Do you… ‘need it’? Because… I know we haven’t been close. And I know I’ve made mistakes. And you hate the Library, and I’m part of that. But you have to know. If it’s for… there is nothing I wouldn’t do, to help. You can trust me with that.”

“I know, Alice. But if I did… need it, I couldn’t share that. You understand.” If the only person who can see and cast the spell is the one who finds it, there is nothing more she can do. And the less chance the Library has of discovering that he has the original version of this apparently _way_ out-of-print book in his possession, the better.

“Okay.”

“I do trust you. And you’ve helped a lot.”

“Good luck.”

“If it works, I’ll buy you coffee next time. And possibly for the rest of your life. As thanks.”

“If it works, I won’t know what you’re thanking me for.”

“Here’s hoping.”

 

* * *

 

Quentin is alone in the apartment.

Eliot is dead. They have a plan to kill the Monster, in Eliot’s body. It’s probably the best chance they have of getting out of this alive, except for the part where it doesn’t save Eliot.

Eliot is dead, he reminds himself. There is no Eliot left in the world to save. Except, if he could alter time…

He should probably keep working on bleeding this infernal stone, but instead, he goes back to the bedroom and takes the book from the nightstand for about the twelfth time today. Flips through it again like this time, it’ll make sense.

Okay. What he understands is: he and Eliot solved the Mosaic, which brought the Time Key into existence. “Time,” therefore, as an entity, owes them something. The book says the spell is a chance to _unlose what was lost_. That’s easy: Eliot.

Jane said, this is about intent. This is about what he wants. Well, that’s also easy: Eliot, alive.

Now it gets thorny: what’s this about reliving moments that matter, and making his intent sing across time? Like, is he supposed to tell all the past Eliots he meets, “Don’t die, please,” and hope that Time, itself, will listen? Maybe in song? That doesn’t seem like the most reliable plan.

Also, there’s the fact that this magic is completely untested, and might kill him. Quentin doesn’t actually care that much about that, if it brings Eliot back, but objectively, he understands that it’s a mark against attempting the spell.

But the thing is, Jane had also talked about the gods, and how they could snuff people out of existence. So if the plan to immobilize the Monster and let the gods destroy him actually works, that will mean that Eliot’s body is destroyed, too. If that happens, and on the off chance that this crackpot spell is real, will it even be possible to bring Eliot back to life after his body is obliterated? Or will he have lost his chance?

The book appeared this morning, out of nowhere. Does that mean that _now_ is the right moment to do this spell, and Quentin will regret it forever if he doesn’t try?

No more indecision. Without thinking, without hesitating, like he was meaning to do it all along, Quentin closes his eyes and casts.

There’s an instant in which he thinks he hears the ticking of a clock and a breeze rustling the leaves, feels the press of a kiss against his lips and the warmth of sunshine enveloping his whole body. But when he opens his eyes, he’s alone in the apartment. His heart is racing, but nothing has happened.

Of course. It was a fucking dream.

That’s when there’s a knock at the door: Alice Quinn, here to save his life. She’s convinced that his and Julia’s plan to trap and kill the Monster will end in his death. Quentin doesn’t really care, but nothing can ever move Alice when she’s convinced she’s right. So he suggests she help him bleed the stone faster, because changing one thing now might change the outcome later, right? Cause and effect.

Something whispers in his mind: that’s not the way this works. But he doesn’t know what that means, and doesn’t really have the time to figure it out.

(Before he opens the door to find Alice, Quentin shoves the book into the drawer of the nightstand. He forgets about it for a long time.)

 

* * *

 

Alone in the apartment, Eliot practices the tuts. He consults the book as he works. If there was ever a time not to fuck up the details, this is it.

It’s interesting. Alice had said the book was incomplete without the spell, but the spell itself seems incomplete to Eliot as he studies it. There are gaps in which another caster would be useful, to anchor his movements by mirroring, or to boost his power. Almost like it’s a cooperative spell, but no second part is included. And as far as he knows, this is the only original version of the book in existence, so who else can cast it except him?

“Someone else is giving it to you,” Eliot says, vaguely remembering the dream.

He tries to focus. He has to make do with the spell he has. Alice had said this was about quantum states: Quentin dead, Quentin alive. Eliot is going to shift reality from one state to the other. The spell is going to find him the moment in time he can make that happen.

Jane Chatwin, on the other hand, had said that the spell was about _intent_. Well, that’s easy, isn’t it? He intends for Quentin not to be dead. If the way to do that is relive a bunch of moments together, and remind Quentin not to die, in order to “work his will across time,” he can do that.

But there’s something else Jane said. The dream is slipping from him now, but he strains to remember.

“It’s all about intent. You have to confront what you’ve _truly_ lost, and what you truly want, for it to work. The spell will help you; it’ll throw you into the stream of Time, into the moments that bring you face-to-face with that loss, and that desire. But you must _awaken_ the moments, make them sing out your intent. You have to remind Time what it owes you.”

“That’s easy. I want Quentin to be alive. No matter the cost.” Eliot will die, to make that happen. He will do _anything_.

“Oh, Eliot,” Jane Chatwin sighs. “You’re missing the point.”

“No, I’m not. He’s _gone_. He’s dead. And I would do anything, give _anything_ for that to not have happened, do you understand? I don’t care if this spell kills me. I don’t care what happens next.”

She’s shaking her head. “I understand, it’s how you express your devotion: ‘I would _die_ for him.’ But in the end, it isn’t about that. You have to face what you _want_. I know, I know, you want Quentin alive. But is that _all_ you want? Or just the bare minimum? You say: I want him alive even if it means I’m dead. But what if it means Margo dead? Or all your other friends? Or everyone else in the world? Would you make _that_ bargain?”

“You think I’m asking for too much?”

“I think you’re not asking for _enough_. Because you don’t think you deserve it. But fortunately, you’re not the only one setting the terms of the bargain.”

“What?” Eliot asks, skipping right past the mention of what he deserves. He knows _exactly_ what he deserves, and he doesn’t want to think about that. “You just said that my intent is all that matters. I’m the one casting this spell you’re talking about, if it even exists.”

“Someone gave it to you, though, didn’t they? Or they are giving it to you, right now. And the last step of the spell is to pass it on; that’s the only way it ends.”

“It’s cooperative,” he realizes. “But… who? What does that mean?”

She just smiles. “I have faith you’ll figure it out. Faith, or foreknowledge. One of the two, anyway. Time magic really is quite complicated. Now, Eliot. It’s time to wake up.”

Not particularly helpful, is she?

Oh well. He’s memorized the motions, and understood as much of the theory as he’s going to. There’s a time for preparation, and there’s a time for action, no pun intended. It’s now, or never. “Sorry, Bambi,” he says out loud. Then, Eliot closes his eyes, pictures the spell, and casts.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Any physicists out there: sorry about the undoubted inaccuracies and oversimplification.  
> Everyone else: sorry about the physics.


	2. Revisions

Quentin opens his eyes.

“Do you feel that?”

A forest. Fillory. The joy of magic back in the air. And Eliot, alive and himself and _laughing_.

“Oh my God,” Quentin says.

“Magic!” Eliot exclaims, folding Quentin into his embrace, lifting him up as they spin around.

They’ve just come through the clock; this is their quest.

And Quentin knows, somehow: this is the moment. Everything that happens now makes the spell he’s cast possible. Their life together, their love, is what calls the Time Key into the world. It is literally magical; it is one of the components of magic.

He’s supposed to be doing something right now, or several things, actually. In the original moment, he’s about to notice that they’re in Fillory past; in his current iteration, he is supposed to make his intent known, remind Eliot not to die, and somehow convince Time to give him back what he has lost.

But Quentin just holds on, and on, and on. Eventually, Eliot gets over his excitement about magic enough to notice that Quentin is sobbing uncontrollably into his chest.

“Hey! Hey, Q,” Eliot says, trying to pull back so he can examine Quentin’s face, but Quentin holds on tighter. “Are you hurt? Come on, what’s wrong? Is this your inappropriate emotional response thing?”

Quentin shakes his head, unable to speak. Eliot waits him out, running a gentle hand across his back. “It’s just,” Quentin chokes out, “so much.”

“What is?” Eliot asks softly, hand now coming up to tuck Quentin’s hair behind his ear. Quentin leans his face into that hand, chasing the contact. “The quest? Having magic back? The opium in the air?”

Quentin laughs, then sniffles. “Having _you_ back,” he says without thinking.

Oh, Quentin has been trying so hard to keep going, just one step after another, and another, and another, not allowing himself to stop. But it is so much, too much. Everything since Blackspire, with Alice’s betrayal, and then _Brian_ , and then trying to save Eliot from the Monster, and then his dad, and now _Eliot is dead_ , and Quentin has resolutely not talked about it, with anyone. He can barely let himself think about it, afraid he’ll break permanently. And the one person he could have told, or at least sat in silence with, and taken comfort from, is the one person who’s gone forever, and somehow, impossibly, the person standing in front of him now.

This is Eliot, but an Eliot who is completely unaware of everything that has happened, or will happen. Eliot, who thinks Quentin is talking about being separated from him because he’s been in Fillory, not because he’s dead.

Eliot, who is giving Quentin that strange, wondering look, the one he had when Quentin crowned him High King, or after Quentin kissed him on the Mosaic for the first time. Like he can’t believe anyone would feel this way about him, or fathom why he deserves their regard.

Because he’s looking for it, Quentin sees the instant Eliot takes the emotional response and tucks it away. “Well, I can’t blame you for being overwhelmed by my presence. I _am_ quite spectacular,” he says.

“You are,” Quentin agrees, too sincere. He can’t help it. He wants to tell Eliot everything he knows he can’t: how much he means, how much he’s missed, how much he’s loved. It would take hours, and days, and years, Quentin thinks, to say it all, not to mention how long it would take for Eliot to believe him. It would take a lifetime.

But if this is his only chance…

“El,” he says. “Eliot.” He takes a step forward, then another, then another, forcing Eliot to step backwards until he backs into a tree.

“Q, what _is_ it?”

Quentin takes a breath. “I just… can I just…” He gives up on words, goes up on to his tiptoes, and kisses him.

And then pulls away, takes a few steps back. He’s doing this all wrong. This isn’t what he’s supposed to be using this spell for, is it?

“Quentin,” says Eliot, low, “you can do whatever you want with me, you know that.” And maybe he means it to sound salacious, but to Quentin’s ears, in this mystical place, in the rarefied air of the past, it comes out sounding like “I’m yours.” Again, he sees Eliot swallow the vulnerability and push past it. Before he can brush it off, however, Quentin cuts in.

Maybe he’s doing the spell all wrong, and all he has to say is some variation on “Don’t die,” but what comes out is: “I’m just so happy to be here with you, that’s all. I missed you, more than you can know. I want to tell you things, that no one else would understand, and you’re not there. I wake up, and I forget that you’re gone, and then I remember, and it’s awful. I keep looking for you and…” Seeing a Monster wearing your face. “I just want…” He shuts up again, unable to continue.

“I get it. I missed you too, Q,” Eliot says, a little bewildered, but with answering sincerity. It’s hard for him, Quentin knows, but he’ll always do it if you need it from him. “And we’re here now,” he continues, comforting. “This is our quest, remember? And once we get magic back, we’ll be able to spend more…” He trails off, confused, and blinks. “More time together. Wait. Wait. Is this — _Q_?”

Startled, Quentin is about to step forward, chasing the sudden _recognition_ in Eliot’s eyes, but too soon, he hears the ticking of a clock, and the scene disappears.

 

* * *

 

Eliot opens his eyes, and he should have known this was coming. He has relived this moment before, in the context of trying to escape the prison of his own mind and tell his friends that he was still alive. Of course, that was in his own memory, and if Jane Chatwin and Alice Quinn are to be believed, _this_ is actually in some quantum iteration of the past, but whatever. Third time around, you’d think he would know what to say.

But it still amazes him. They spent a lifetime together, on the key quest that apparently made this whole spell possible, and here Quentin is, asking for more.

“What if we gave it a shot? Would that be that crazy?”

This is the moment. They’ve always had possibility, but it’s never been addressed directly, outright, like this. Bravest, dearest Quentin: seeing the shape of something he wants, and just asking for it. Asking Eliot, the most useless and undeserving person of all time, who just snuffed it out.

“Hey,” Eliot says now, which is not actually an appropriate answer to the question he was asked.

“Hey,” Quentin says back, because they’re dumbasses, but they’re dumbasses on the same wavelength.

Eliot kisses him. It’s not how it happened on their anniversary on the Mosaic, the way Quentin kissed him so tentatively, and Eliot, though surprised, had escalated, because that was what he knew how to do. This time, Eliot makes the first move, and it’s graceless, zero to sixty, yanking Quentin forward and practically into his lap, seriously making out, hands wandering, about ten seconds to losing clothes, even though they’re in a place where anyone could walk in, and really, Margo married a child psychopath here. Eliot doesn’t care; he just wants. More than wants; he’s _starved_. Because Quentin is… Eliot breaks the kiss, only so he can press his lips to the corner of Quentin’s mouth, his jaw, his neck.

“Um,” Quentin says, now that his mouth is not otherwise occupied. “Is that a yes?”

“That’s an ‘I’m in love with you, Q,’” Eliot confirms, into his neck, and Quentin actually gasps, surprised, and pulls back to stare at him. Well, maybe Eliot doesn’t have the best track record with saying those words out loud.

And _oh_ , wait, Eliot is getting caught up, but this is a spell, and in real life, or the reality they originally lived, Quentin never heard those words. Quentin had _died_ thinking… “I loved you then, and I love you now, and I’ll always love you, forever, forever, it could never be enough. It’s not enough.” Eliot is babbling, and about to cry, he realizes wildly, and he sees the instant that Quentin realizes it too, the way it makes him tender and concerned.

“Okay, now I don’t feel like my idea was that crazy. You’re talking like… El, are you okay?”

“Yeah. No. I don’t…” He turns his face away, and manages to hold back the tears. He is fucking out of control. He hasn’t shed a single tear since the night of the bonfire, not alone, not with Margo. But here, facing Quentin, knowing he’s dead, and at least in part, _for Eliot_ … how does he deserve his kindness? How could he possibly deserve his love?

“If it’s…” Quentin hesitates, but puts a hand over his. “We just went through a lot, and I know that getting the memories back is overwhelming. If it’s not what you want, if it’s just making you emotional…”

“No! No. Q. I just really love you, and I want… I want to try. I’m afraid, because… I’ve never done it like this before. I know I don’t deserve… but I want to.”

Dimly, Eliot thinks, this is not what he’s supposed to be saying. He’s supposed to be weaving his intent into this moment, making sure that Quentin knows not to die, or something. But how can he stare at any version of Quentin (let alone _this_ one) and not tell him these things, all these things he never got the chance to say, and never will, unless this ridiculous garbage fire of a quantum devotion spell actually works? Maybe _Eliot_ doesn’t deserve it, but _Quentin_ deserves to hear this.

“We did do it, though,” Quentin says, like he’s trying to reassure Eliot. His kindness stabs Eliot through the heart, but it’s its own balm, too. Eliot has missed him so, so fucking much. “We had a lifetime, El. We can do it again. I really... I love you too. I know our lives are fucked up, and it won’t be like the quest again, but we can figure it out. We have… we have time.” He blinks, and his eyes widen, as though in recognition. “Wait, this isn’t… _Eliot_?”

 

* * *

 

_Awaken_ , Quentin thinks, and opens his eyes. These moments, Jane had said: you must make them sing out your intent, and _awaken_.

He’s in a hallway at Castle Whitespire. The spell must give him some kind of time-sense, because although he’s been in this hallway many times, he knows that this particular time, he’s about to walk through a door and say goodbye to Eliot, leaving him in Fillory alone.

It’s a time spell, Quentin thinks angrily. It picked this moment. It can give him a fucking second to get himself together before he has to go through a fucking goodbye, knowing that Eliot is dead now.

Is Eliot dead, though? Or is the spell working? Because that flash of recognition in Eliot’s eyes, like he was waking up and becoming aware of the spell: couldn’t that be what Jane meant by _awakening the moment_?

Quentin isn’t sure how he did it, if he did it. He knows his intent: he wants Eliot to live, no matter what. He’s just not sure how clearly he expressed that by crying all over him, vomiting feelings, and making out. Does that count as “confrontation”? Maybe the spell and Time allow for some artistic liberties of expression?

“Is _that_ what you want, Quentin? Truly? Is that _all_?”

Quentin shakes his head against the echo in his ears. It’s familiar, but he can’t remember anyone saying it to him. Anyway, _yes_ , strange voice, Eliot alive is what he wants. Isn’t that what this spell is for? Quentin just has to stay on track this time around, and figure out what triggers the move from one memory to the next.

With that in mind, he steels himself and steps into the doorway, holding up his crown to Eliot, who’s poring over the paltry selection of books left in the ransacked castle library. “Hang on to this while I’m gone?”

“Oh. You guys all packed?”

“Yeah. El, thank you,” Quentin says, sticking to his original words, because he doesn’t want to start crying again, and because he means it with his whole heart. Eliot gave so much, for all of them, and for Quentin in particular. Beyond this one moment, did Quentin ever thank him for any of it? Did he ever tell Eliot how much it meant?

“For what… taking one for the team to the tune of the rest of my life?” They share an understanding look, before Eliot opens his mouth to brush it off. He’s going to talk about the problems Fillory is facing, and about champagne, before circling back around to the thing that’s really bothering him. But _the rest of his life…_ Quentin can’t bear it, suddenly, and jumps ahead.

He comes forward to join Eliot where he’s sitting, too close, and says, “It’s going to be okay, El. You’re going to make it through this. The rest of your life…” He chokes on the words for a second. “It’s going to be long, and brilliant, and happy, okay? You’re going to survive.” There, he thinks. Intent expressed. He waits, but nothing happens.

“Yeah. Yeah,” Eliot says finally. “But I mean, uh, in the books, time doesn’t exactly run the same speed on Earth as in Fillory. So this long, brilliant life. Might just be me, as I live out my days, waiting for my friends to return, and die alone.”

He had, in the end, died alone, hadn’t he? Possessed by the Monster, unable to communicate with any of his friends, and Quentin doesn’t know if he was aware, or if he was in pain, or if he was just _gone_ , the instant the Monster took his body. It’s unbearable, listening to Eliot express this fear, in his casual, roundabout way, knowing what’s going to happen.

“Don’t die,” Quentin tries, and it’s a ridiculous thing to say, he realizes, but Eliot must see something in his face, because his answering eyeroll is affectionate.

“Okay. Just for you,” he says, and maybe he means it to be sarcastic, but it comes out soft. And Quentin could live in this moment forever — basking in the warmth of Eliot’s gaze and wrapped up in the tenderness of his voice, one of the few people to understand the depths of his kindness, the extent of his heart — but the spell is going to activate, isn’t it? He’s expressed what he wants, and Eliot has even acknowledged it. Time to go.

But, no awakening. No ticking clock. Whatever it is that takes him from one memory to the next, Quentin hasn’t done it yet.

He looks up again, and Eliot is still watching him, fond and a little sad. It’s becoming a pattern, but Quentin can’t help himself. He leans in for the kiss, gentle. Eliot allows it for a second, but then disengages, as gently. “Q,” he says. “Alice.”

“Oh,” Quentin says.

“Look, I know you’re hurting. But the two of you… maybe it’ll work out. And I promised I wouldn’t betray her like that again.” Eliot looks wretched, and noble, and every inch the High King he is, always, no matter what Fillory did with him in the end. “Also, I have a wife.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Eliot says, with a smile. It’s like the other expression was never there. He pats Quentin’s shoulder. “What are friends for?”

He means it, that’s the thing. He really thinks that he’s some sort of consolation prize, or easy fuck, or mistake. He has _no idea_.

But maybe, in the original past, Quentin hadn’t done much to make him think otherwise.

“Hey,” Quentin says. “It’s complicated, with Alice. But it was my fault. I shouldn’t have blamed you.”

“It was my fault too,” Eliot says. “I shouldn’t have disregarded what it did to you.”

“Maybe. But look. The mistake was that I cheated on her. _You’re_ not the mistake. You mean a lot to me, okay?”

Eliot manages a little smile, realer than the first one. “Naturally.”

“And…” This part is hard, because how can Quentin say, “Alice and I don’t work out. We don’t _work_ , in the end, not the way you and I do” without betraying both Alice, and his past self? It’s not fair. And “If I weren’t in love with Alice at this point in time, I would be with you” sounds patronizing at best, and actively hurtful at worst.

“Look, right now, I owe it to Alice to try to make this up to her. I hurt her. And there’s this part of me that… loves her,” Quentin says, which is the truth, even if that part feels small and distant now, chipped away and alienated by the years that have come between. “But that doesn’t mean… the way I feel about you…”

“Q. We don’t have to do this. Let’s save our overthinking for the Beast that’s going to kill us, and the kingdom I have to rule if we somehow don’t die, yeah?”

“Eliot. Just let me say this. Can you just listen, please? I need you to hear me.”

“Okay,” Eliot says, like it’s the greatest concession of his kingship thus far.

Quentin could say, “Don’t die,” but he’s already tried that. And anyway, what he wants to say is: “It’s like, there’s a seed. And ever since I met you, I’ve known, somehow, that it’s going to grow into something hugely important, and wonderful. It _is_ growing. And whether that ends up being the best friendship I’ve ever had, or… or… something else, I can’t say. Not right now. But whatever we are, together, I want that, okay? I don’t want to lose you.”

Eliot’s eyes are suspiciously bright, but he rolls them again anyway. “You won’t,” he says, like it’s obvious.

“I won’t,” Quentin repeats. He won’t. Not this time.

“Anyway, maybe it’ll all be fine,” Eliot says, striving for airy and unconcerned and almost making it. Quentin loves him, so, _so_ much. “Maybe I’ll deserve the crown that the land of FIllory has bestowed on me. Maybe I’ll even deserve your terrifying faith in me.” He pauses, before continuing, more quietly, looking down at his hands, “And, ‘whatever we are, together.’ One day. I mean, provided we don’t all die first, and have enough… enough time.” He looks up and meets Quentin’s eyes. “ _Q_ ,” he breathes, “we need more—”

 

* * *

 

The ticking of a clock, and Eliot opens his eyes. He’s on the Brakebills campus, and yes, there’s Quentin, head down and miserable, rushing by. He jogs a little to catch up.

“Hold up,” Eliot says. “Uh, what is this?”

“My books. I’m headed to return them. You’ve heard, I assume. Word travels fast, when your life’s over.”

“Don’t say that,” Eliot implores, and he gets in front of Quentin and faces him so he has to stop. “Your life isn’t over.” Eliot won’t allow it. He won’t. This fucking spell is going to work, even if it makes no sense and he has no idea _how_ it works, or if it’s working. He’s gotten from one past moment to another, which has to mean _something_ is happening. Progress, albeit in an unclear direction. Eliot can work with that; Eliot can work with anything.

“They’re bringing in a Specialist,” Quentin says, and then when Eliot remains silent, he continues, “Yeah. Thanks. Ominous.”

“Look, I’m sorry. But—”

“I don’t know, I keep trying to tell myself this is somehow better, you know, not to know. ‘Cause, who would want to know that—that magic exists, if there’s nothing you can do about it, you know, if there’s no one to teach you, or help you.”

It has always been there, hasn’t it, this belief of Quentin’s that his life is worth nothing without magic? Eliot understands it, to some degree; he knows what it is to grow up different, and unhappy, and to discover something that explains _why_ you’re different, but paints that difference with a new brush, as something powerful and special. But… Quentin _is_ special. Whether or not he ever performs a spell again, he’s _everything_ : good and kind and true, persistent and brave, and so sincere it hurts to look at, especially when you’re a jaded, cowardly, empty shell of a person, unworthy of his light.

Margo had talked about Quentin’s _sacrifice_ for all of them _,_ for magic and the world, like it was the epitome of his bravery, and maybe it was. But in the quiet of the night, when Eliot suffers the torment of his worst thoughts, he wonders if maybe it had actually been Quentin giving up. Deciding his life wasn’t worth continuing, after all. Maybe they had failed him, Eliot most of all, and the bleak, dark void of a world without him is no less than they deserve.

Well, maybe Eliot isn’t enough, but he’s the only one here now. “Your life’s not over,” he repeats, willing this baby first-year Quentin to understand.

“How is it not?” Quentin spits out, voice shaking. “How do you… you don’t see color and want to go back to black and white.” He sighs. “You do not have to make me feel better, we—really, we basically just met each other.”

He starts walking, but Eliot cuts him off again. “Well, I bond fast. Time is an illusion.” He takes a breath, trying to find the right words this time around, not just blasé platitudes. Oh, he had cared about Quentin, even then, but he hadn’t made it known. He hadn’t been clear. “Look, even out there. Even if you don’t have magic. Your life is worth something. You need to live.”

Quentin needs to live. There, spell: intent expressed. Couldn’t be clearer. Eliot is _communicating_.

Nothing happens.

Quentin scoffs. “Why, Eliot? I go back there, and I’m… I’m a depressed super nerd.”

Why isn’t it _working_? And what should Eliot say next?

He could say, “Your depression isn’t all that you are,” or “What the world calls being a nerd just means that you’re passionate, and honest, and beautiful; the way you _believe_ in things, and love things, and hope, takes a courage most people can’t even imagine.” It’s all true, but would Quentin, _this_ Quentin, believe him?

What he says is: “My life is better because I met you.”

Quentin blinks. “You don’t even know me,” he says, although less combative than before, and Eliot supposes that’s fair, from his point of view.

“But I want to. If your memory gets erased today, and you have to leave Brakebills, and you don’t remember me, you won’t remember the loss, but I will.”

“Oh. Well. That makes me feel better.”

Eliot sighs. Dear, angry, small Quentin. He tries again. “What I mean is. I could find you. It wouldn’t be the same as learning here, but I could find a way to remind you about magic. You could still learn.” What will it take, for Quentin to want to live? For this spell to work?

“That — are you serious? That’s against the rules. You could be expelled yourself, for doing that.” Eliot shrugs. “Why would you…” Oddly, it seems to pull Quentin out of his paralyzed despair. He steps forward to touch Eliot’s hand hesitantly, instead of closing in on himself like has been for the entire conversation. “Don’t do that,” he says. “I couldn’t do that to you. You’re… I think you’re the only friend in the world I have right now. Even if it’s just for the next few minutes.” His eyes are wet, threatening to spill over.

Oh, what the fuck. Eliot will try this the original way. “Well, then, how about I find you, and I don’t say magic is real, but I do seduce you, and so lift your spirits that life retains its sparkle for decades.”

“Yeah, that sounds nice. Thank you.”

“Okay,” Eliot says, and that’s how they left it in the original moment. But now, he lets himself think about it. Going out into the world and seducing an unsuspecting Quentin Coldwater, and then returning to Brakebills, and Margo, and magic. Having that once, and never again. How could it ever have been enough?

At the time, he had thought Quentin was cute, and sweet, and shy, and he had wanted to take him apart, mess him up, make him blush and gasp and quiver under Eliot’s touch, unable to stutter out anything besides a single syllable of Eliot’s name. Selfish and destructive hedonist, thy name is Eliot Waugh. But no, no, that’s revisionist history. Even then, Eliot admits to himself, he’d been chasing Quentin’s smile, too. He had wanted to comfort him when he was sad; he had wanted to be there for him, in whatever small way he could; he had just wanted to _be with him_ , relishing every moment of understanding, or silence, or laughter between them. Even if he couldn’t understand, or didn’t want to admit, why.

“Fair warning: I might have to stick around for a while,” Eliot says now. “To make sure that the… sparkle retention takes.”

“What?”

“Well, how would I know if your spirits stay lifted for decades unless I hang around at least that long?”

Quentin looks like he thinks Eliot is a bit crazy. Which, again, not unfair. He also looks like he’s trying to decide whether he’s being made fun of, or whether Eliot is serious, but finally elects to take him at his word. “Eliot. Why do you even care?”

“I just do,” Eliot says, and Quentin actually smiles. It shouldn’t feel like such an accomplishment, given the stakes of this spell, and how Eliot is _failing_ , but well. It does.  “Apologies in advance, it’ll be a poor consolation prize for all of magic. But I’ll be there, promise.”

Impossibly, Quentin holds on to the smile, though he still looks sad. “You know, actually, in all the stories, magic isn’t about power, or what you can do. The real magic is always what lives between the characters: love, and friendship, and loyalty. So thanks. For reminding me. That I haven’t lost everything.”

“Any time,” Eliot says.

“For what it’s worth,” Quentin adds, “I hope you do find me.” He continues, in a rush, “I mean, maybe you’re just joking, or like, trying to make me feel better, but I—I want to know you, too.”

You wouldn’t think that an innocuous statement like that would be enough to make Eliot, of all people, feel _shy_ , but even after all this time, Quentin’s sincerity and hopefulness are so disarming. He just _says things_ , and Eliot can hardly believe he _exists_ , but he loves him so much. And Eliot’s not sure he’s worth being known, but if Quentin wants to know him, Eliot will submit himself to that ordeal. It doesn’t even sound like an ordeal, at this moment. It sounds like happiness.

“You will,” he says, certain, and leans in to kiss Quentin’s cheek. At the last second, Quentin turns his head, and catches his lips for the briefest of instants.

“It figures,” Quentin says, frustration winding its way back into his voice, “that I would be admitted to and then expelled from a magic school within a week, and in that week, I would meet someone like _you_ , who could be… who I won’t even remember meeting. It’s not fair. I just wish we had more—”

Quentin trails off, looking startled, but Eliot actually thinks he sees where this is going. “Time?” he asks, and hears, again, the ticking of a clock.

 

* * *

 

When Quentin opens his eyes, he’s in a place he knows well: Kady’s apartment in Manhattan. There are two people there he knows well too: Eliot and Margo. He almost apologizes for interrupting what is obviously a serious and private discussion, but then realizes that they can’t see him, because he’s dead.

He has the book in his hands. The Get Out of Jail Free Card that was tucked into it like a bookmark, however, has vanished. This is apparently where the spell wants him to be.

“Just go, Bambi,” Eliot says. He’s sitting on the edge of the bed, pale and wan, and he sounds tired, but he’s not wincing with every movement like he was the night of the bonfire. Margo is standing, hands on hips, looking determined.

“You’re coming with me, El. What are you going to do here by yourself? Your wounds have healed enough so you can travel to Fillory, and you can rest on your ass there just as well as here.” She hesitates, real concern breaking through the browbeating. “El. It might be good for you, to get away from it. A change of scene.”

Eliot laughs. It’s not happy. “Margo. _He’s dead_. How do you get away from something that’s… you think it wouldn’t follow me, wherever I went?”

He isn’t crying, or raising his voice, but somehow, the tearless, blank despair is even harder to behold. Quentin takes an aborted step forward, before he remembers, once again, that he’s dead. Margo is clearly feeling it too, however, because she sits down next to Eliot and takes his hands in hers.

“El. I’m here. No bullshit. I just got you back, and I’m worried about you. Tell me.”

Eliot swallows. When he speaks, it’s low. “He’s dead. And I keep thinking, I wish the axes had killed me, so I didn’t have to live like this. I wish I was still trapped inside the Monster, unaware. I wish you all had never tried to save me, because maybe then, he’d be alive.”

Margo is shaking, but it’s not tears. It’s rage. “You fucking dickhole. You selfish fuck. Do you have _any idea_ what it was like for us when you were gone? What I had to do, what Quentin had to deal with, to get you back?”

“I think, actually, I do know what it was like. Maybe it was like how I’m feeling now. Except, there actually _was_ something you could do. You got me back. Congratulations.” This is wrong, Quentin thinks. Eliot can be casually cruel, or even pointedly mean, but he isn’t vicious like this, and definitely not to Margo.

Margo blinks, and now there _are_ tears in her eyes. She doesn’t give in to them, though, and doesn’t let go of Eliot’s hands, even though her grip looks more punishing than comforting. “I loved Quentin too. We all did. And I know you’re grieving, Eliot. But you don’t have a monopoly on grief. We’re all dealing with this. You’re not alone.”

Eliot laughs again, joyless. “Bambi. I know you loved him. I know you’re grieving too. But you need to go, and I can’t go with you. This is not something we can do together. I… you are the best friend I have ever had, and I love you. But you can’t understand this.”

Margo, never relenting, says, “Make me understand.”

“You’re sad about Quentin. But you have a life. You can see a future for yourself, and for…”

“Is this about _Josh_?” Margo asks incredulously. “What, you think that because I’m in a relationship, that I don’t care about you, or _Quentin_ , anymore? That being in love means I can’t be myself, and know what I feel? Because fuck that, El. What are you, jealous?” He flinches. “Or what, you’re sitting there thinking that if Josh died, _then_ I’d be able to understand what you feel? Because almost losing you wasn’t enough?”

“I would never wish that on you,” Eliot says quietly. It’s like only one of them can be vicious at once: he has deflated. “And that’s not what I meant. I want you to be happy. You know that.”

Margo loses her steam at that. “Yeah. I know. Eliot, I’m sor—”

“No. Look. I know you love me, and you just want me to get better. And I _do_ want you to be happy, more than I want anything else that’s left in the world. But I can’t be around that, right now. Maybe it makes me an awful person, and I am, but I can’t watch you in love without thinking about everything… all the things that I’ll never…”

Oh, Quentin thinks. _Oh_.

“It’s not never, Eliot. It feels like it, but it’s not.”

He smiles, helplessly. It is a terribly sad expression. “Do we know that?”

“I get it,” Margo says at last.

“Thank you.”

“I’ll go back to Fillory. I’ll leave you here, on a trial basis. I’ll come back as often as I can. But I swear, El, if you fuck up your recovery, if you self-destruct, if you try to fucking kill yourself with drinking and drugs, if you…” She straightens up and looks him in the eyes. “You would be betraying Quentin. He _died_ for you, for all of us, and if you throw that sacrifice back in his _dead memory’s face_ …”

“I would never do that,” Eliot interrupts.

“Good.”

“Not because of how he died. He was brave because of how he lived. And I—” He breaks off, takes a breath.

“What?”

“I promised, once, that I would try to be as brave as he was. I just didn’t realize that this is what that would mean.”

They’re quiet for a while. Finally, Margo stands up. “Alice will be here tomorrow, to check on you.”

“Setting up a neighborhood suicide watch?”

“We’re your friends, dipshit. Fuck that, you’re my _family_. And Alice could maybe use a friend too, you know. Given everything that’s happened. She might even understand, more than you think I can.”

Eliot sighs. “You’re right, as always. I’ll do my best, Bambi.”

Margo leaves soon after. Quentin watches Eliot, waiting, though he doesn’t know for what. None of the other moments he’s visited with the spell have been like this; they’ve all been moments he’s lived through before, and then relived. But here: he doesn’t have a body. He’s not alive. This is a future that doesn’t belong to him. He’s not sure what he’s supposed to do, to relinquish this spell, or get it to relinquish its hold on him, so that he can move on.

Apropos of nothing, Eliot slides down and off the edge of the bed, until he’s sitting on the floor with his back to it. “We could’ve been something,” he reflects into what he must think is an empty room. “We had all these moments. We had all this potential. And we never talked about it, and the one time you tried, I just shut you down.” He takes a breath. His eyes are still dry, his voice still quiet. “This is what I deserve. I deserve this. I deserve this. I deserve this.”

He closes his eyes and stops repeating himself, like it’s too much to bear, and lets his head fall back against the bed. Eventually, he drifts off into an uneasy and uncomfortable sleep.

Quentin, who has been standing frozen, gives in to the impulse to move all at once. He’s stepped forward and fallen to his knees in front of Eliot before he realizes it. “Eliot,” he says. “ _No._ ”

This isn’t what he wanted. Maybe when he cast the spell, in the throes of despair, and in all the dark months afterward, all he wanted was to save Eliot’s life, even if it meant his own death; he didn’t care. But now, looking at this future, it’s not enough. This can’t be what he intended.

“You don’t deserve this,” Quentin whispers. “You deserve to be happy. You deserve to be loved. And I — I don’t know if people can _make_ other people happy. But I know that the happiest I’ve ever been has been with you. And even when I’m miserable, if you’re there, I feel less alone. You make me believe that, maybe, one day, it’s possible —”

This is the thing they’ve lost, Quentin realizes. What he had lost, when he thought Eliot was gone forever; what Eliot is living through the loss of now. Death is the loss of possibility. It wasn’t just the loss of Eliot, brilliant and spectacular and singular though he is. It was the loss of everything they might have been together; _that_ was what drove him, desolate, to cast dangerous, unknown time magic in the first place.

The spell is about intent. Way back at the start of this, Quentin had thought, “Eliot alive,” and called it a day, but the spell isn’t over yet. What if that hadn’t been his only, or his final intent? Because if the thing he actually wants, and wills, is nothing less than _a life together_ , then getting Eliot back at the cost of Quentin’s own life can’t possibly be the culmination of the spell.

He reads, again: “The spell culminates in communication of the caster’s intent, along with passage of the book, to the next caster. In this way, the completion of the journey ensures the driving force of the journey, the intent, without which the spell could not have been cast.”

How else could he have gotten the book? Who else could have cast the spell?

This is the moment, he realizes. This is the moment when Eliot is feeling exactly what Quentin was, the night before he woke up to find this book: the loss that drove him to cast the spell, and start this journey. And if Eliot has done, or is going to do, the same for him…

“I don’t know how this works,” Quentin says. “Communicating my intent. We haven’t been the best at that. I thought I was ready to move on. And I don’t know if I had to die, so that you all could live. I was willing to do that, if it was the only way. But if it wasn’t. If I had a _choice_. If this is about the outcome I _want_. I don’t want to die for you. I want a life with you.”

He sets the book down in Eliot’s lap and hesitantly reaches his hands out to Eliot’s face, terrified that he’s a phantom, and the illusion of his body will just pass through. But he makes contact, and feels warm skin, and delicate bone, and scratchy stubble. And when he leans forward and gently kisses Eliot, it feels like a breath of life.

The book is glowing, and the glow is spreading. He’s done it. He’s passed on the spell; it’s Eliot’s turn, now. He hears the ticking of a clock, and he doesn’t know where the countdown will take him this time, back to the doorway, or back to the world, but he knows what he wants.

Quentin closes his eyes, and smiles, and hopes.

 

* * *

 

This time, when Eliot opens his eyes, the knowledge of the moment he is in feels different. The Monster is occupying his body, he realizes. The Eliot of this time is in the Happy Place, blissfully unaware. He hasn’t yet found the door to let Quentin know he’s alive, so theoretically, this isn’t a moment he should be able to access. But whatever magic powers this spell has taken the Monster’s consciousness out of the equation, for now. Eliot doesn’t know how long he has. All of the other moments he’s gone through were ones he was present and aware for, which gave him some idea of what he was going to say, or do. Now, though…

“Eliot is dead,” echoes in the air. “Your friend, Eliot, is dead,” he hears, in his voice, but they’re not his words. The Monster had told Quentin he was dead, he realizes, and Quentin would soon be working on a way to kill the Monster in turn. Bleed a stone, immobilize, the gods attack, Eliot remembers, though he’s not sure how much is coming from the time-sense of the spell, and how much he recalls from what Julia and Alice have told him.

Regardless, he suddenly _knows_ how close he came to dying that day, in a way that hadn’t quite occurred to him before. If he hadn’t found the door in his mind at exactly the right moment, in the real world, when he was standing in front of Quentin, no sooner, no later, Alice would have immobilized him and Iris would have killed the Monster in his body. Eliot would be dead without Quentin ever having known there was a chance for him to be alive.

Lucky, he thinks. Too lucky. What are the chances, what’s the _probability_ that Charlton would show up in Eliot’s Happy Place, and Eliot would work his way through all his worst memories, _just in time_ to give Quentin the knowledge he needed to save Eliot’s life? The knowledge that he was alive in there, after all?

It’s almost as though someone had cast a spell, to choose that improbable outcome from the infinite possibilities contained within that moment. A spell cast _for Eliot_.

Oh, he’s been an idiot. This is a cooperative spell.

In his present day reality, Eliot cast the part he had without a partner, unsure of where the other half of the spell was or who had access to the book besides him, but this is a spell that literally _spans across time_. Someone else had given him the spell. Someone else had already cast it, at some point. Who else could it have been?

_Dreamers, who have devoted lifetimes to the service of Time…_ Isn’t that what he _and Quentin_ had done, together?

And how else could Quentin have gotten the spell, unless Eliot had given it to him in turn?

It’s night, here. He wanders through the apartment, searching for Quentin. He finds him at last in what must have been his bedroom, asleep on top of the covers, with the lights still on, like he hadn’t had any idea or intention of going to sleep. Even in repose, he looks miserable. Worn out. Dimmed, somehow, of all the light and the hope that emanate from him, even when he’s in his darkest places. He brightens the world, though he never sees himself the way they all do. And Eliot, stupid, cowardly, careless, cruel Eliot, who should have spent every day of the rest of his life telling Quentin how much he was worth, how much he was _loved_ , will never have the chance to do so. He wishes…

Oh, Eliot realizes. “You’re not asking for enough,” Jane Chatwin had said, and this is what she meant. He wants Quentin to live, of course. He would be willing to die, if he could hold his life in the balance, and earn Quentin’s instead. And Eliot has made mistakes; he doesn’t think he deserves to be happy, and he knows he could be happy with Quentin, and that scares him, and he’s run from it.

But if this spell isn’t about cost, or deserving; if it’s simply about what he truly _wants_ …

Is he brave enough to face it? Is he brave enough to ask?

He takes the book out of his coat pocket and opens it to the last page, the one that details how to pass the spell on. This is it; this is the moment. He has no idea if it will work, but he has to try.

As much as he wants to wake Quentin up, and hear his voice, and give him hope, he thinks that this part will work better if Quentin just wakes up to find the book. He has only his own experience to work from, after all. So Eliot steps forward and very gently, places it on his chest. But he can’t help himself, and so leans forward and kisses Quentin’s forehead.

He whispers into the dark, “I’m not dead, Q. You saved me. Or you’re going to. And now I’m trying to save you, because… I think I’d take whatever I could get, no matter the cost, if you could just be alive, but if this magic, or physics, or whatever, is about what I _want_ … I want our life together. I want our future. I don’t know if I deserve it, but I would try, _so hard_ , if I just had the… baby, we’re not done. I want more _time_.”

The book is emitting a soft golden glow, which is spreading to envelop Quentin’s body. Eliot has done it. And, for what he thinks will be the last time, he hears the ticking of a clock, marching toward the end of his journey. The magic is fading. He closes his eyes.

 

* * *

 

Quentin opens his eyes and he’s tumbling on to the lawn of Brakebills in broad daylight. Even without whatever magic is powering this spell, making him immediately aware of what moment in time he has entered, he would know this one anywhere, anytime, anyhow.

Sure enough, Eliot is there, reclining on a wall like some kind of ridiculous odalisque, cigarette in hand. His gaze flickers over Quentin briefly, before he sits up, all indolent grace. He glances down at a card in his hands.

“Quentin Coldwater?”

“Uh huh,” is all Quentin can manage. Not because he’s bewildered by how he ended up there, or even just dumbstruck at the sight of Eliot being peak Eliot, like he was the first time, but because his heart feels like it’s going to pound out of his chest. Dimly, he thinks, feeling your heart _beating_ doesn’t seem like the sort of thing you should feel when you’re dead, but it’s like it knows that it belongs to the person in front of him. Pulse racing, fingertips tingling, dizzy with it… every part of him wants to reach out and touch, and take, and taste, and just be together, forever. This is it: the moment they met, the instant that every possible future they could have together came into being.

Eliot hops down from the wall easily, and steps forward, so they’re standing close. “I’m Eliot,” he says, with another, more interested once-over. “You’re late.”

He’s about to turn and say, “Follow me,” Quentin knows, but he doesn’t get the chance. Largely because Quentin has gone up to his toes and pulled Eliot down by his collar or his tie or _some_ item of clothing, who cares, and kissed him.

There’s a shocked little inhale, but Eliot kisses back immediately: like it’s reflexive, at first, and then like it’s more than that, more open and desperate and real than the parts of yourself you would normally give to a stranger. Almost like a part of him _knows_. But when he pulls back, there’s no recognition in his eyes.

“Now you’re even later,” Eliot says, but he is out of breath, and his eyes are wide, and he looks young, somehow. He recovers quickly, expression returning to its baseline level of nonchalance, imbued with a condescending sort of surprise. Like he’s perfectly used to random strangers kissing him without impetus, but wouldn’t expect anything so interesting from someone who looks as timid as Quentin.

“It was worth it,” Quentin says. Eliot raises an eyebrow.

“I’m flattered, but you don’t know that. You’ve got a test to take, and it just might be the most important one of your life. I’m good, I know, but worth missing that? Come on, follow me. If you’re too late, they might not let you in, and it turns out I’m mildly invested in you not failing, Quentin Coldwater, because I want a chance to ask you what the fuck that was.”

Eliot’s turned away and started walking while he’s speaking, and Quentin hurries to catch up, just as he remembers it happening before. But this time, he catches Eliot’s hand and holds it as they go on together. Eliot looks down at their hands, and then sneaks a sideways glance at him, wondering, but doesn’t let go. He takes a drag off his cigarette with his free hand.

“I’m not going to fail,” Quentin says, certain, because fuck. He gets it. He’s sung it; he’s awakened. This spell is about intent. Eliot’s life, yes, and yes, Quentin would be willing to die, to save Eliot, but that’s not what he _wants_. And he knows, just by the fact that they’ve cast this spell together, laced their devotion across Time, that Eliot feels the same.

Every moment that he has relived, this is the chord they have unwittingly been striking throughout Time: they deserve to explore the possibilities, together. That’s the debt they’re owed. After all, what had they given, together, to bring the Time Key into the world?

“Oh?” this dear, ridiculous past Eliot asks.

“Definitely not.”

“And how, pray tell, do you know that?”

“Because. You and I? Eliot, we deserve a chance. We deserve more time together.”

Eliot stops suddenly. He turns to face Quentin, puzzled. “We deserve…” But then, miraculously, the most beautiful thing Quentin has ever seen: his expression clears, and it’s Eliot, _his_ Eliot, who breathes, “Q, we deserve a _lifetime_.”

 

* * *

 

Eliot opens his eyes. His heart is pounding, breath coming fast, and it was a dream. His misery carried him off to sleep and of course he would dream of every chance he might have had, how his future could have been alight with so much joy and hope and anticipation, if only… if only… every breath, every heartbeat, from now until the end of his joyless, hopeless life, that will be the refrain. _If only we had more time._

But then the sheet rustles, and there’s a surprised intake of breath from his left that Eliot would know anywhere.

It’s dark in the room, although he can see early morning light filtering through the cracks in the blinds as he sits up, slowly, afraid to look over, still reeling from the crashing despair of reality after the warm languid sunshine of the dream.

“Eliot?” It’s Quentin’s voice.

“No. It can’t be. I’m… I’m still…”

But that is Quentin’s hand on his hand, gentle, shuffling a little to find a hold in the dark. “Eliot,” he repeats. “Eliot. The spell. Was it… did it happen?”

Eliot waves his other hand and the bedside lamp switches on. Telekinesis: still useful. He remembers his promise to be brave, the one he thought he would never have the chance to fulfill, and looks over. And it _is_ Quentin, sitting up too. Somehow, impossibly, in his bed, like he’s been and belonged there forever. His shorter hair is fluffed up comically in all directions, his lovely eyes wide and dark, and there’s a pillow crease on his face. He looks ridiculous, yet perfect, and very much alive.

“Q. You died.”

“I’m here,” Quentin says, sounding as incredulous as Eliot feels. “I’m…”

Eliot hauls him in and kisses him, and if it’s a dream, it’s realer than anything he’s ever felt. When they break for air, he keeps him close, foreheads touching, sharing breath.

“You did the spell. I gave it to you…” Eliot realizes.

“When I needed it the most, when the Monster told me you were dead, and I just wanted you _back_ , it was all I cared about. I cast it, but I didn’t remember any of it, not until I was going to go on to the Underworld, and I couldn’t, because it wasn’t done, I had to pass the spell on, complete the…”

“You were dead, and I woke up with the book, and then I cast it, and now…”

“You _completed_ it.”

“Or you did. Because I gave it to you after I got it… wait, who did it _first_?”

Quentin laughs, disbelieving. “’Time magic is complicated,’” he quotes.

“Oh, you got the spiel too? You think that’s just rote standard in the spell?”

“Wait, Eliot. Do you think… is everyone else okay? Is everything else the same? Me being back, does it change anything?”

“I… you know, Q, I think everyone else is fine. It’s like… you’re Schrödinger’s cat. We both are.”

“What?”

“The cat, in the box. Dead and alive at the same time, until you open the box and know what version of reality you’re in. The spell, it just shifted quantum states, and you’re alive instead of dead. And so am I. Drastic improvement.”

“Since when do you know quantum physics?”

“Why, did that make sense to you? I guess you actually did listen to Alice once in a while when you guys were together. I thought it was all arguments and make-up sex.” That makes Quentin shove at him halfheartedly, and Eliot pulls him in again, saying, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. No joking. I just… it _happened_.”

“I know,” Quentin says.

“I realize it’s kind of anticlimactic and obvious after we’ve cooperatively cast a spell to bring each other back to life, which was powered by the fact that our love is apparently woven through the _fabric of time_ , but I really fucking love you, you know.”

“I really fucking love you, too,” and even though Eliot’s closed his eyes against the embarrassing tears, he knows Quentin is smiling, because the hand that isn’t holding Quentin’s is resting against his cheek, cupping his face like he’ll never let go again.

He does, though. He even opens his eyes. Through the wondering disbelief, and the overwhelming relief, he confronts the fear: what if it’s not real? Or what if the price was steep; what if this cost him _Margo_ , he thinks, with a flash of real panic, and then, as an afterthought, or everybody else? “Should we… should we go out and check?”

“Face the world?” Quentin asks.

“I’d really rather not, when you put it like that. I’d rather stay here, with you.”

Quentin kisses him again, quickly, then kisses his cheek where the treacherous tear has made its escape. “We’ll do it together,” he decides. “And then come back, and stay in bed for hours. Days, maybe. I’ll let you up to go to the bathroom, and to get us food.”

“Well, if _that’s_ the incentive, Q…” Eliot still hurts, he realizes as he gets up, but he’s healing. Anyway, there are plenty of interesting things he can do even with the injuries; it would take more than an axe or two to injure his _imagination_.

Tentatively, they make their way out of bed, and then out of the bedroom, still holding hands like they’re afraid if they let go, the moment will disappear.

The blinds in the living room are open, and Julia is in the kitchen, pouring herself a cup of coffee. She looks a bit pale and serious, but when she sees them, she doesn’t react like she’s lost her best friend and is now seeing him come back to life.

“I didn’t think you guys would be up for a few hours, at least,” she says.

“Couldn’t sleep,” Eliot says casually, just as Quentin says, with zero chill, “Julia! Are you okay?”

She smiles and rolls her eyes. “I told you, I’m fine, Q. I’m not going off the deep end. Maybe I’m not a goddess anymore, but I still have magic.”

Quentin still looks worried, like he is going to pursue this further, but Eliot has more pressing concerns. “Margo. Where is she?”

The second in which Julia turns to look at him and pause before answering feels like an eternity. The only thing he registers is Quentin squeezing his hand. “In Fillory?”

“Is that a question, or an answer?”

Julia stares at him, and adopts the tone of voice one would use to explain something to a small, stupid child. “She just left yesterday, remember? Eliot, are you okay?”

“Fine. She left yesterday. To be with… Josh,” he tries. “Because Josh is also okay. And Fen.”

“I thought the consensus was you’re fine with that. What with the whole ‘I don’t need your blessing’ and ‘of course not, but if you want to fuck the fish, fine by me,” and the ‘enjoy your sexless honeymoon with the first-year nerd, since you’re still recovering from my axes, bitch.’”

“She said that?”

“You both did. Very loudly. Last night.”

Eliot turns to Quentin. “Bambi’s okay! And you got her blessing, no surprises there.”

“I’m not a first-year nerd,” Quentin says, adorably put out. “Anymore.”

“Oh, baby. You’ll always be a first-year nerd to me.” In fact, he just was. They look at each other, remembering.

“Uh, okay, I think that’s my cue. Or actually, how about you both go back to your room, since I was here first?”

“That is an _excellent_ idea,” Eliot says, trying to pull Quentin by the hand, but he digs his feet in.

“Wait. Julia. The others. Alice, and Kady, and Penny-23,” Quentin says quickly, as Julia’s face twists a little at the last. “Everybody, they’re all okay?”

“As okay as our lives get, I guess,” she says. “I mean, Alice still isn’t ready to be around… you guys, together, yet, but you know. Give it time. What is wrong with you today?”

“Nothing,” Eliot cuts in. “Absolutely nothing is wrong.” He drags Quentin away, adding, “P.S., I owe Alice coffee every day for the rest of her life. She may misinterpret my reasons, come to think of it, but regardless. Make a note, because I’ll forget, and this is now our shared burden, forever.”

“I don’t know,” Quentin says, as they reach the bedroom. “We’re sharing debt now? Co-signing gifts? I mean, have we even done the relationship talk yet? Like, where is this going? Do you see a future for us?”

Eliot looks over, an incredulous retort on the tip of his tongue, when he sees the teasing light in Quentin’s eyes, the half-smile. Oh. Dork.

He plays along. “You know, Q, I don’t think we have. You’ve been quite remiss in _confronting what you want_.”

“Well, I think you need to better _communicate your intent_.”

“Hm. Maybe tomorrow,” Eliot says, mostly intent on walking Quentin back to the bed.

He goes willingly, but adds, smile widening, “Or the day after. Because, you know. We have—”

“Don’t you say it,” Eliot murmurs, stupidly happy, sending up a thank you to the entity in question before kissing the word out of Quentin's mouth.

**Author's Note:**

> "There will be time, there will be time  
> To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;  
> There will be time to murder and create,  
> And time for all the works and days of hands  
> That lift and drop a question on your plate;  
> Time for you and time for me,  
> And time yet for a hundred indecisions,  
> And for a hundred visions and revisions,  
> Before the taking of a toast and tea."
> 
> So, how subtle was my meta-analysis on how these characters deserved more time together?  
> Also, time magic IS complicated. Not sure why my mind saw that and said, you know what would make it better? Quantum mechanics.  
> Thanks for reading, and I'm always happy to chat in the comments if you have thoughts! :)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic of] A Hundred Indecisions](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20642168) by [exmanhater](https://archiveofourown.org/users/exmanhater/pseuds/exmanhater)




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